BoatSense — Editorial Reviews

Editorial Reviews

As a dinghy racer who came to sailing bigger boats relatively late in life, I only wish Doug Logan's wonderfully engaging and instructive treatise had been around 20 years ago when I chartered my first keelboat. Warm, accessible, and wickedly smart, BoatSense is an instant classic.

— Nathaniel Philbrick, author of In the Heart of the Sea and Second Wind

 

Lifelong sailor and longtime boat reviewer Doug Logan knows all too well how modern marine hardware and electronics can complicate sailors' lives, draining batteries and bank accounts. As he presents a clear alternative approach to boat ownership he calls BoatSense, Logan enlivens his views with humor, warning of pitfalls like the Gear Overkill Syndrome. Good sense and good boats have rarely been so clear and entertaining. He speaks right to the heart and head of any sailor.

—John Rousmaniere, author of The Annapolis Book of Seamanship

 

If you are even remotely interested in boats, you need to read BoatSense. Doug Logan shares his extensive personal experiences in a way that is both fun to read and educational.

—Ed Sherman, author of The Powerboater's Guide to Electrical Systems

 

Hundreds of books claim to enlighten beginning boaters, helping them make sensible choices when buying a vessel and learning the ropes of ownership. Few I have read accomplish that as well as BoatSense, perhaps because few authors who live, breathe, and bleed boating as Doug Logan does have the skill to share experiences and lay out personal preferences in authentic fashion and with a dash of humor. This slender volume is a handy compendium for beginning boaters, but it’s just as useful for professionals in the trades as a reminder that less is often more—as in: less hassle but more fun.

— Dieter Loibner, Professional Boatbuilder

 

Working as a marine journalist has its perks, including running the newest boats, traveling to great ports, and writing about a subject you love. There are downsides, too, such as long hours, working weekends and boat show marathons. The best professionals are able to make it all work, though, and wildly entertain their readers along the way. Doug Logan is one of those writers.

— Gary Reich, Soundings

 

 I get sent a lot of books which get sorted into three piles: give-aways, keepers that’ll likely go unread, and prospects. The prospect pile is ready for vacations, and I’m glad I had Doug Logan’s BoatSense on a recent cruising adventure. I don’t know how long it had been waiting for me, but the wait was worth it.

Doug is immensely knowledgeable but equally adept at realizing how his way is his way, and perhaps not the only way. What he shares in this book is the obvious and not so obvious about boating, reminding the lifetime boater about our addiction, while enlightening the newcomer.

—  Craig Leweck, Scuttlebutt Sailing News

 

What a charming book this is! A slim volume, but with a surprising variety of material in it. There’s a good deal of standard-issue practical advice you might find in other marine how-to tomes, but here you find it steeped and strongly marinated in a special sauce unique to Doug Logan...one of the more widely experienced marine editor/writers of our generation... For all his experience and excellent writing chops, Doug is a humble soul, never one to paint himself as an expert, and very down to earth. The sort who does not set out to exterminate the rat he finds on his boat while living aboard at City Island in his younger days, but to negotiate with it: A rat faced me down once when I was on the gangway headed to the dock. He was already on his way up. We both stopped. I took another step forward, then he took another step forward. He was a big rat, as well-nourished dock rats tend to be, and after a short standoff I backed away and let him come up. He was pretty stately about it, too.

—  Charles Doane, WaveTrain.net

 

Comfortable. BoatSense is a comfortable book to read. And enjoyable. And informative. And don’t forget humorous. BoatSense is likely directed at those who are thinking about buying a boat, or are relatively new owners, but informs old hands as well. Doug writes from decades of experience aboard boats (both power and sail) and marine journalism. I found his book a great combination of wisdom, stories, and what we all depend on now and then, checklists.

— Gregg Bruff, Good Old Boat

 

About the Author

Doug Logan has been managing editor, technical editor, and executive editor of Sailing World, webmaster for Cruising World, contributing editor of Powerboat Reports, editor-in-chief of Practical Sailor, and senior editor at the websites of the Boat Group. He lives in Stony Creek, Connecticut.